


Even Heroes Need to Rest

by Aragarna



Category: White Collar
Genre: Fluff and Crack, Gen, Humor, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-26
Updated: 2014-10-26
Packaged: 2018-02-22 18:39:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2517806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aragarna/pseuds/Aragarna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a mission gone wrong, Neal wakes up a little confused about the situation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Even Heroes Need to Rest

**Author's Note:**

> This is an unexpected entry for the Caffrey-Burke day. Blame [](http://kanarek13.livejournal.com/profile)[**kanarek13**](http://kanarek13.livejournal.com/) and [](http://sheenianni.livejournal.com/profile)[**sheenianni**](http://sheenianni.livejournal.com/) for it. Though I also need to thank Kanarek for the beta on incredibly short notice. Mention of fictional works are not so coincidental. This can be seen as an indirect sequel of [Who's the Princess Now?](http://aragarna.livejournal.com/36170.html) or not (no need to read it to understand this one).

**Even Heroes Need to Rest**

  
The first thing Neal noticed, as he slowly regained consciousness, was the fluffiness. He was lying in the most comfortable bed he has ever been in – and he had been in the bed of a real princess before. The second thing he noticed was that he felt vaguely high. He cracked his eyes opened. Everything around him was white, but the light not so bright that it would hurt the eyes.

“Hi, Sweetie. Welcome back.”

Neal looked to his left and saw Elizabeth seated by his side, smiling softly at him. Neal smiled back, unsure of the situation.

“Do you remember what happened?”

Neal shook his head – which he regretted instantly as the room started dancing dangerously around him. Was he drunk?

“You fell down an elevator shaft. And then the building collapsed. I think there was hypothermia, unless it was severe food deprivation?”

This sounded terrible, and yet Elizabeth didn’t seem that worried. She could have been talking about the weather, her tone wouldn’t have been more casual. Neal tried to remember but his memory was all fuzzy, and he was feeling so light…

“You still need some rest,” Elizabeth said, gently patting Neal’s hand, resting on the top of the fluffy comforter.

“Where’s Peter?” he asked.

Elizabeth tilted her head and looked fondly at Neal. “He was very upset not to be able to be there for when you’d wake up, like he usually does, but he was called on a new assignment.”

“Assignment?” Neal asked, feeling sleep slowly winning over.

“You know, this time of year is always very busy, with the Big Bang season and all.”

Elizabeth was really not making any sense. Wait – _usually_?

\-------------------------------------

Neal woke up again when he heard the door of the room opening. Peter was rolled in on a hospital bed by two men in white lab coats. Peter was conscious, though he looked extremely pale.

“Thank you, guys,” he said to the two men, who gave him a nod and left.

“What happened to you?” Neal asked, concerned by Peter’s chalk-white skin.

“Gunshot wound to the chest.”

At that moment, the door slammed open and Elizabeth rushed in to be by Peter’s side.

“Oh, Honey,” she said, brushing her fingers along his cheek.

“Hi, Hon,” Peter said, way too cheerfully for someone who just took a bullet to the chest. “Don’t worry, I’m fine.”

“ _Fine_?!” Neal repeated.

Peter looked at him and Neal could swear his eyes were sparkling with amusement.

“It was just a PG-13, no big deal. It was more angst than whump. Though there was lots of blood. I hate when they put so much blood. But anyway, she made sure no vital organs were hit.”

“She?”

“Bomerlover heart underscore heart ninety-eight.”

Neal opened wild eyes. Either he was losing his mind, or Peter was totally insane.

Peter and Elizabeth exchanged a look.

“I think he has memory losses again,” Elizabeth said.

Peter looked over at Neal with visible concern. “It’s getting more and more frequent.”

“I’ll get the doctor,” Elizabeth said.

“Peter, what is this place?” Neal asked when she was gone.

“Heaven,” Peter answered with obvious bliss as he cuddled farther under his fluffy comforter.

But Neal was tired of all this nonsense. “Seriously,” he said with impatience.

Peter sighed and straightened up in his bed.

“This is the FCRC, the Fictional Character Regeneration Center. And, believe me, it is the closest thing on Earth to Heaven. We’re sent here to recuperate after a rough assignment.”

“What is that thing about assignments?”

“Each time someone writes you, as a character, that’s an assignment. Luckily, not all require us to be hurt, not that we _need_ to be hurt to come here.”

“Have I been there before?” Neal asked, remembering his conversation with Elizabeth earlier.

“Oh, yes, you’ve been here. A lot more than me, actually. You’re definitely their favorite whumpee. I do come visit you, of course, but I’m not that often brought in as a patient. But I really love this place. No danger, no drama…”

“Whumpee? What is that? Are we in a Roald Dahl story or something?”

Peter chuckled. “I didn’t make up all that vocabulary.”

“But how come I don’t remember any of this?”

Peter’s expression softened. “ See that IV line, tucked in your arm?”

Neal followed Peter’s pointed finger. An IV line was indeed connected to his right arm, filling a translucent and almost fluorescent liquid to his body.

“That’s Regenerative Fluid,” Peter explained. “Some magical drug fixing you up in no time. It’s an awesome drug, but if you take too much of it, you start experiencing some unpleasant side effects. Memory losses and confusions are some of them, also the most benign.”

So that was probably what made him feel high. He _was_ high.

Neal swallowed the lump of anxiety in his throat. “What are the other effects?”

“You don’t want to know,” Peter said hastily.

“So did I take too much of it? That doesn’t sound like something I’d do.”

“Well, the doctors still need to patch you up after each hurtful assignments, and you get so many… It also probably doesn’t help that you’re not spending much time in here. Generally, you’re barely awake that you’re sent back out there.”

“That’s not fair!”

“The price of your success I guess.”

\-------------------------------------

Elizabeth finally came back with the doctor. He was wearing a similar lab coat as the two previous men, and had a stethoscope around his neck.

“Hello, Neal, Peter,” he greeted them.

“Hello Jim,” Peter said.

The doctor checked Neal and Peter’s monitors, took their temperatures, asked them to follow his finger – up, down, left, right – then took notes in his notepad, nodding mostly to himself.

“Let’s proceed to the usual check-up,” the doctor said, moving toward Peter.

“Usual name?”

“Peter Burke,” Peter answered dutifully.

“FC ID?”

“WC-2.”

“Status?”

“Minus Six,” Peter said, rather gloomy.

“Oh I’m sorry to hear that,” the doctor said.

Peter shrugged, but Neal could see he was hurting.

“Canon death?” the doctor inquired.

“Cancellation.”

“What is that about?” Neal asked.

“The show has been cancelled. Our canon closes in six episodes.”

“Ah right.” Now that Neal remembered. A very painful moment that he had tried not to think about too much at the time. The fact that he had been recuperating from a week of being buried alive had helped, but he should probably talk to Peter about what that would mean for them concretely.

“Your turn, Neal,” the doctor said after taking a few additional notes. “Usual name?”

“Neal Caffrey.”

“FC ID?”

“Hmmm…” Neal looked over at Peter for help.

“It’s your Fictional Character ID,” Peter explained. “WC-1,” he said to the doctor. “See, doc, he’s getting all confused again.”

“I see,” the doctor said, taking more notes. “Well, maybe the cancellation will allow you to take it easy, Neal.”

“Don’t count on it too much,” Peter said. “Not right away at least. I think they just love him too much.”

The doctor glanced at Neal from above his notebook, a smile at the corner of his lips. “You can’t really blame them."

“I know, right?” Peter replied.

“All right,” the doctor said when he was finished with his notes. “You two should be able to catch lunch in the cafeteria. Have a nice day, lady, gentlemen. I hope to see you again soon. But not _too_ soon,” he added with a wink.

“Thank you, have a nice day, doctor.”

Not five minutes after the doctor had left, and to Neal’s great disbelief, Peter energetically pushed back his covers and jumped out of bed. “Let’s go grab some lunch, then, I’m starving,” he said.

“Peter, how can you be out of bed so quickly?”

Peter shrugged. “I’m all good. And I’m sure you are too. Don’t you feel hungry?”

Now that he thought of it, Neal was feeling perfectly fine, and yes, actually, he _was_ hungry.

\-------------------------------------

Neal followed Peter and Elizabeth to the cafeteria. As they passed through neat corridors and luxurious patios everything looked strangely foreign and yet somehow familiar. The building was of a very refine modern architecture style, with a mix of glass, wood and concrete. In one of the patios, they crossed path with Tony Stark, who was a lot less impressive in flesh than Neal would have thought.

“Hey!” he greeted them, “the White Collar team!”

“Hey Tony, what’s up?” Peter asked him cheerfully.

Tony shrugged. “Pretty good. Back from a hypothermia-crash combo. The usual.”

Peter laughed. “Routine, huh?”

“Well, I still have it easier than Steve.”

“What happened to him?” Neal inquired.

“Some terrible disease, depression. All the crazy shit. I don’t really know all the details, but you know this things, takes you so long to get back to your feet, and the poor guy has barely the time to enjoy the place before being sent back.”

Neal winced. This sounded familiar.

If the building was impressive, it wasn’t until they started waiting in line in the cafeteria that Neal fully embraced Peter’s use of “heaven” to describe the place. Everything looked so appetizing that he couldn’t decide what to take. He ended ordering enough food for two consecutive lunches. And a chocolate tart.

“Oh look who’s here,” Peter said pointing to a table in the middle of the large dining room, “Rick Castle!”

“Rick!” He said to the writer as they all sat around him.

“My favorite consultant-cop crime-fighting duo!” Castle exclaimed, greeting them with a wide smile. “Well, after me and Beckett”, he quipped.

“How are you doing, Rick?” Elizabeth asked.

Rick picked a couple of French fries from his plate and turned pensive. “Well, actually I’m not sure. I mean, I sooo wanted this wedding to happen.”

“What happened?” Neal asked.

“I was kidnapped.”

“Oh welcome to the club!”

“Five minutes before the ceremony.”

“Ouch.”

“But here comes the best part. I have a two-month memory lapse. So I have no idea what happened to me. Like, _canonically_ no ideas. Except that it’s so horrible that I don’t want to remember. For all I know, I could have been kidnapped by aliens.”

“Reavers?”

Castle turned to Neal, raising an inquiring eyebrow. “What?”

“Nothing,” Neal muttered, plunging his nose in his truffle stuffed guinea fowl.

“How about you three? A joined mission? An OT3 gone wrong?”

“Oh I’m just here visiting my boys,” Elizabeth said, a protective hand on Peter’s shoulder.

“Actually, we were both on separated missions. I was assigned with Mozzie, for once.”

“The little guy? How come we so rarely see him around?”

“You know how he is, he hates that place. Way too many Agencies represented for his liking,” Peter smirked. “He drives me crazy. I honestly much prefer being assigned with Neal.”

“You’re just saying that because that means you get to share the whump,” Castle laughed. “So about you, Neal?”

“Apparently, I fell down an elevator.”

“Wow, you always get the most crazy stuff.”

“Says the guy who’s just been kidnapped by aliens.”

A vague commotion at the door made them all look up. Two men in stern suits were coming their way.

“Burke, Caffrey, you’ve been assigned a new mission.”

“Already?” Peter protested. “We barely got here! Let me at least finish my chocolate tart!”

Both men shook their heads, though they didn’t protest as Peter grabbed his tart, encouraging Neal to get his too, before getting up.

“Sorry, gentlemen, you know what day this is.”

Neal and Peter exchanged a look.

“October 23rd. Today is your anniversary.”

“Oh,” Neal and Peter said in chorus. “Let’s go then.”


End file.
